NYC Democratic candidate mirrors Trump's campaign strategy
The Democratic nominee's campaign for New York City mayor is a mirror image of Donald Trump's first presidential campaign. Their political images might be reversed, but their campaign tactics are awfully similar.
New York City Democrats nominated state assemblyman Zohran Mamdani as their candidate for mayor in a primary on June 25. While the office of mayor has little to do with foreign policy, Mamdani has made pro-Palestinian Arab and anti-Israel pronouncements a centerpiece of his campaign and, as he himself says, of his political identity.
Before ever running for office, Mamdani sent his “love to the Holy Land Five,” five Americans convicted of illegally donating to the terrorist group Hamas. His posting on social media the day after the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, which killed over 1,200 Israeli civilians, did not mention Hamas by name at all. Instead, he wrote that a lasting peace would come only after Israel ended its “occupation” of Gaza. Only one problem: There were no Israeli troops in Gaza on Oct. 7. They only entered Gaza in response to the attack on Oct. 13. Mamdani was spreading untruths that fit his political views.
Trump used the issue of immigration in a similar way. Announcing his candidacy in 2015, he declared, “When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best … They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists.” Of course, the country of Mexico wasn't itself sending any people, let alone drug dealers, criminals and rapists. More recently, Trump has deceitfully accused the country of Venezuela of invading the U.S. He's modeling political behavior for Mamdani.
Mamdani has defended calls for “a global intifada,” which implies attacks on Israel and Jews around the world, as a call for “Palestinian human rights.” In the wake of Oct. 7, 2023, there have been a firebombing at a Melbourne synagogue, hit-and-run assaults on Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam, the murder of two attendees at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., and countless more incidents. No matter. Mamdani is appealing to his core supporters who regard condemning Israel and downplaying attacks on Jews as a prerequisite to being a true progressive.
In his first campaign, Trump did concede some of the immigrants from Mexico are “good people.” In last fall's, he even shouted out, “I love Hispanics.” During his primary campaign, Mamdani proclaimed he “loves Jewish New Yorkers.” In a postprimary meeting with New York City business leaders, Mamdani said he would discourage use of the phrase “globalize the intifada.” No matter in either case. The followers of Trump and Mamdani heard the dog whistles and know where they stand.
Bob Dylan sang “You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.” Trump certainly didn't need a political meteorologist to detect the winds of change sweeping across the country in regard to immigration. Likewise, Mamdani sensed a gale in regard to American views on Israel. Nationally, the number of Democrats with a negative view of Israel has increased from 53% to 69% in the last three years.
While the Democratic leaders of both the Senate and the House, New York's Chuck Schumer and Hakim Jeffries, remain steadfast in their support of the Israeli state, Mamdani understands that the future of the Democratic Party is to stand four-square against the Middle East's only democracy. He is proving himself by opposing PEPs, a leftist term of derision for those who are “progressive except for Palestine.”
Mamdani mimes Trump's tactics in another way by promising much more than he could ever deliver. In 2016, Trump promised to build a “great, great wall” along the southern border, paid for by Mexico. Mexico paid nothing, and the wall that was built was both short and easily breached. He also pledged to end Obamacare and set up a half-trillion-dollar infrastructure fund — neither of which happened.
Mamdani's list of promises that will never be kept might even be longer than Trump's. He has promised free child care, higher taxes on the rich, borrowing $70 billion to build 200,000 units of affordable housing, free fares on buses and nearly doubling the minimum wage to $30 per hour in the next five years. The state legislature would have to go along with most of these initiatives, and the chances of that are zero.
Otto von Bismarck, the 19th century German chancellor, famously said, “Politics is the art of the possible.” Trump and Mamdani are proving Bismarck's aphorism to be outmoded. Instead, for them politics is promising the impossible.
Once nominated in 2016, Republicans rallied around Trump. In March of that year, then-Sen. Marco Rubio warned, “For years to come, there are many people on the right, in the media, and voters at large, that are going to be having to explain and justify how they fell into this trap of supporting Donald Trump.” Six months later, Rubio endorsed Trump and today serves as his secretary of state.
A similar dynamic is at work with Mamdani's candidacy. New York City Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler, former chair of the House Judiciary Committee and a longtime supporter of Israel, endorsed Mamdani after his primary victory, as have Democratic Rep. Adriano Epsaillat, Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado and Attorney General Letisha James. Epsaillat explained his decision, saying that “If there is a common denominator in every decision that I've made since I began to represent this district, in terms of supporting someone, it's called the Democratic Party.”
If there is indeed a common denominator among politicians of both parties that Trump and Mamdani can rely on, it's an unprincipled thirst for power.
In Robert Louis Stevenson's classic story, the respectable Dr. Jekyll looks into a mirror and sees himself as the hideous and deformed Mr. Hyde. If Mamdani could peer into that same mirror, he might well see an image of Donald Trump.
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